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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23548357">The Day of the Doctor</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marcus_S_Lazarus/pseuds/Marcus_S_Lazarus'>Marcus_S_Lazarus</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Twilight Storm [14]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Who, Twilight Series - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Crossover, Multi Doctor Story</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 16:54:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>16,498</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23548357</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marcus_S_Lazarus/pseuds/Marcus_S_Lazarus</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A trip to Elizabethan England to tie up a loose end results in Bella Swan witnessing the most impossible day in creation</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Bella Swan &amp; Clara Oswald, Tenth Doctor &amp; Bella Swan, Three Doctors &amp; Bella Swan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Twilight Storm [14]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1694503</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Zygon, the Queen, and the Rupture</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After our previous journey had resulted in me making friends with Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White, I supposed that I should have been fairly casual about the idea of meeting more royalty, but when I learned that we'd landed in sixteenth-century England to visit Queen Elizabeth I, I had to admit that I was more excited about that possibility than I supposed I should be. My relationship with Shakespeare had its ups and downs- particularly when I looked back on some of his plays; <em>Romeo and Juliet</em> no longer had the same appeal to me as it had in the past- but the era itself still intrigued me, so the chance to see it for real had immediately captured my interest.</p>
<p>I just wished that I had a chance to see more of it than what I'd witnessed so far. Our brief visit to various princesses had apparently reminded the Doctor of something he had to do involving Queen Elizabeth I, but when we'd arrived, he'd run a scan that had revealed the presence of another time machine in the area. Following the signal to its source, he had discovered a ship that he had identified as a Zygon ship, explaining that the creatures were a race of shapeshifters he'd encountered a few times in the past. As a result, I had been told to stay inside the TARDIS while he spoke with the Queen; until he knew what the Zygons were up to, he'd wanted to limit the risk of the Zygons trying to use me against him.</p>
<p>With nothing better to do with my time, I had retreated to the TARDIS library to catch up on my reading after changing into a loose brown outfit that I felt fit the standards of the time. I was wearing trousers as opposed to a dress, but I felt that the loose white shirt and brown jacket looked like what the standard person from this era would wear based on the Shakespeare films I'd watched in the past. I'd also pinned and arranged my hair in a manner that should make me look like a boy at casual glance; if a crisis arose, I wasn't going to waste time dealing with people who might not want to take orders from a girl. There were times when I'd resented my thinner frame, particularly when compared to the likes of Rosalie, but right now I had to admit that it should make things easier-</p>
<p>My thoughts were interrupted when my phone began to ring from its position on a nearby table, prompting me to put down my book and pick it up.</p>
<p>"Hello?" I said, surprised at the unexpected interruption.</p>
<p>"<em>Bella</em>?" the Doctor's voice yelled over the line. "<em>You need to get out here; Queen Elizabeth's on the run and our horse was a Zygon</em>!"</p>
<p>"The <em>horse</em>-?" I began in confusion, wondering when the Doctor had found the time to get a horse.</p>
<p>"<em>Just get out here; I need help to keep track of this and the Zygon doesn't know about you yet</em>!" the Doctor explained. "<em>Get the other scanner and get out here; it'll lead you to me</em>!"</p>
<p>"You mean… that thing you left on the console?" I asked, getting up and hurrying back to the console room as I spoke; once he'd realised what we were dealing with, he'd developed a spare scanner for me as well as his own, but I'd left it on the TARDIS console until it was needed.</p>
<p>"<em>Precisely</em>," the Doctor replied. "<em>I'm sending it a program that will allow it to lock on to my scanner and alert you to Zygons; when you leave the ship, run towards the beeping and run away from the whistling</em>!"</p>
<p>"Uh… sure thing," I said, as I ran into the console room. "See you soon!"</p>
<p>With the call ended, I picked up the scanner and checked my reflection in the time rotor's reflection, confirming that my hair was still done up in the appropriate manner. Assured that I wouldn't stand out, I ran out of the ship, the scanner out in front of me as I hurried through the woods towards wherever the Doctor might be heading. If I kept on the move and paid attention to the box's signal, I should manage to avoid the Zygon in the area…</p>
<p>"…Doctor," I suddenly heard my friend saying from another direction, prompting me to quickly turn towards the voice. "I'm nine hundred and four years old, I'm from the planet Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous. I am the oncoming storm, the bringer of darkness, and <em>you</em> are basically just a rabbit, aren't you?"</p>
<p>As I finally reached the source of the voice, I couldn't help but smile at the sight of my friend crouching beside a stump, glaring at the rabbit that he had apparently misidentified as a Zygon; maybe Earth was being invaded, but you had to laugh or you'd never get anywhere.</p>
<p>"OK," my friend said, clearly embarrassed at his mistake. "Carry on - just a...general... warning."</p>
<p>"To the world's rabbits?" I asked, smiling at him.</p>
<p>"Doctor!" another voice suddenly yelled before he could respond.</p>
<p>"Elizabeth," the Doctor said, his voice low as he stood up and hurried towards the source of the call, leaving me racing to keep up. As we arrived in a clearing, I saw a red-haired woman in a golden dress lying on the ground near an old ruin of some kind, clearly shaken as she sat up.</p>
<p>"That thing…" the woman said, looking at the Doctor in shock as he helped her to her feet. "Explain what it is! And what it wants of us! …And who is this?"</p>
<p>"This is… Ben Swan, my… apprentice," the Doctor explained hurriedly, waving an awkward hand at me before looking around; this wasn't the time for me to get indignant about being introduced as a boy, so I didn't. "As for the Zygon, I'm still trying to figure that out; it probably just wants your planet…"</p>
<p>"Doctor?" another voice said, the three of us turning around to see a woman approaching us who I quickly realised was the exact double of the queen.</p>
<p>"Stay away from her, Doctor," the new arrival said firmly. "That's not me; that's the creature."</p>
<p>"How is that possible?" the Elizabeth we'd helped to her feet said, looking at the new arrival in shock. "She's me. Doctor, she's me!"</p>
<p>"I am, indeed, me," the new arrival said, as the Doctor pulled out his machine and began to hit it while the two queens circled each other, leaving me to stand beside him and hope the impostor didn't do anything drastic. "A compliment that cannot be extended to yourself."</p>
<p>"Extraordinary!" the first Elizabeth said. "The creature has captured my exact likeness… this is exceptional."</p>
<p>"Exceptional?" her double repeated. "A Queen would call it impertinent."</p>
<p>"A Queen would feel compelled to admire the skill of the execution - before arranging one," the original Elizabeth countered, apparently regaining her old confidence.</p>
<p>"It's not working!" the Doctor said, hitting his machine before he took mine and examined it. "Not yours either; they're too close to distinguish which is which…"</p>
<p>"One might surmise the creature would learn quickly to protect itself from any simple means of detection," one of the Elizabeths said; I'd lost track of which was which when I was looking at the Doctor.</p>
<p>"Clearly you understand the creature better than I," the other Elizabeth reflected. "But then you have the advantage."</p>
<p>I was saved from having to ask the Doctor what we were meant to do now when some kind of strange hole suddenly appeared in the air above us, resembling an upside-down golden whirpool of some sort.</p>
<p>"Back, all of you, now!" the Doctor yelled, moving forward to stand underneath the new thing, the Elizabeths behind him while I stood to the side. "That's a time fissure, a tear in the fabric of reality. Anything could happen!"</p>
<p>"Like-?" I began, before a small red thing suddenly fell through the fissure, landing at the Doctor's feet.</p>
<p>"For instance… a fez," the Doctor said, picking up the hat and studying it for a moment before something else fell through the fissure. I was amazed to see that the new arrival was a young man dressed in an old burgundy coat over a grey waistcoat, with dark trousers and brown leather shoes, as well as thick brown hair.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. The Three Doctors</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>To try and limit confusion, when I say 'the Doctor', I'm referring to the Tenth Doctor as Bella considers him 'her' Doctor, while the Eleventh is 'the other Doctor' and the War Doctor is 'the old man' until further notice</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"Who is this man?" one of the Elizabeths asked.</p>
<p>"That's just what I was wondering…" the Doctor said, as he put the fez on to stare at the new arrival.</p>
<p>"Oh, that is skinny," the other man said, standing up to stare at the Doctor, turning to one side as he studied the Time Lord. "That is proper skinny… I've never seen it from the outside, it's like a special effect."</p>
<p>With that said, he walked up to the Doctor and knocked the fez away with a casual swipe of his hand, grinning all the while. "Oi! Matchstick Man!"</p>
<p>For a moment, the Doctor simply stared at the new arrival, tilting his upper body and moving his arms as the other man copied his actions, a thoughtful expression on his face suddenly replaced by realisation.</p>
<p>"You're not…" the Doctor began, before he and the other man both reached into their jacket pockets, the Doctor pulling out his sonic screwdriver while the other man pulled out a longer, slightly thicker device in gold and silver, with a green light surrounded by four silver claws at the top…</p>
<p>I suddenly realised who this man had to be; that comment about 'seeing it from the outside', his small device that could only be a sonic screwdriver…</p>
<p>"Doctor?" I said, looking at the new arrival uncertainly.</p>
<p>"Bella!" the other man said, looking at me with a smile that at least confirmed my guess; not only was this man the Doctor, but he was the Doctor from the <em>future</em>…</p>
<p>"Compensating?" the Doctor said, looking at the other man's sonic screwdriver with a pointed stare.</p>
<p>"For what?" the other man- the other <em>Doctor</em>- asked, looking indignantly back at the Doctor; I was actually grateful for the chance, as I was still trying to process the revelation that there was another Doctor present, even without the fact that this one was a future version rather than the past one I'd encountered before.</p>
<p>"Regeneration; it's a lottery," the Doctor said, shrugging dismissively as the two closed their screwdrivers, tossed them into the air, and then put them back in their pockets, in almost mirror images of each other.</p>
<p>"Oh, he's cool," the other Doctor said dismissively. "Isn't he cool? 'I'm the Doctor and I'm all cool; oops, I'm wearing <em>sandshoes</em>'!"</p>
<p>"What are you doing here?" the Doctor hissed at the other man, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. "I'm busy!"</p>
<p>"Oh, busy?" the other Doctor asked, looking over at the two queens as he put the discarded fez on. "I see, is that what we're calling it, eh? Hello, ladies."</p>
<p>"Don't start," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Listen," the other Doctor said as he turned back to my Doctor, "what you get up to in the privacy of your own regeneration is your business-"</p>
<p>"One of them is a Zygon," the Doctor clarified.</p>
<p>"Urgh…" the other Doctor said, before looking apologetically at the Doctor. "I'm not judging you."</p>
<p>I was about to ask how either of them could judge the other for anything when a strange whooshing sound emerged from the fissure that the other Doctor had just fallen through. As I looked up anxiously, the two Doctors each pulled out a pair of glasses and put them on as they studied the object, each man pausing to notice and compliment the other's eyewear before turning back to the matter at hand.</p>
<p>"Your Majesties," the other Doctor said, taking off his glasses and looking back at the queens, "probably a good time to run."</p>
<p>"But what about the creature?" the queens said simultaneously.</p>
<p>"Elizabeth," the Doctor said, putting his own glasses away and pointing both arms in opposite directions, "whichever one of you is the real one, turn and run in the opposite direction to the other one."</p>
<p>"Of course, my love!" the other women said simultaneously.</p>
<p>"Stay alive, my love!" one of them said, hurrying forward to take 'my' Doctor by the face. "I am not done with you yet."</p>
<p>With that said, she kissed him passionately and then ran off, leaving the Doctor looking somewhat bemused as the other one walked up.</p>
<p>"I understand," she said. "Live for me, my darling; we shall be together again."</p>
<p>As with the other queen, she gave the Doctor a passionate kiss before running off in the opposite direction to the other, leaving the other Doctor and I looking at the Doctor in surprise.</p>
<p>"Well… won't that be nice?" the Doctor said, lost for anything else to say.</p>
<p>"One of them was a Zygon, you know," the other Doctor said, as the two resumed looking at the portal thing above us.</p>
<p>"Yeah," the Doctor noted.</p>
<p>"Big red rubbery thing, covered in suckers."</p>
<p>"I thought it looked more orange, actually," I said suddenly.</p>
<p>"<em>Not</em> helping, Bella," the Doctor said, looking at me in exasperation.</p>
<p>"Still covered in suckers," the other Doctor said. "With venom sacs under the tongue-"</p>
<p>"Yea, I'm getting the point, thanks," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Nice…"</p>
<p>"<em>Doctor</em>!" an unfamiliar voice called from what I assumed was the portal above us; I certainly couldn't see anyone else in the woods, and the echo in the voice certainly sounded like it came from a tunnel. "<em>Is that you</em>?"</p>
<p>"Ah!" the other Doctor said, smiling as he looked up at the protal. "Hello! Clara? Can you hear me?"</p>
<p><em>Clara</em>…</p>
<p>I'd met Steven Taylor and Sarah Jane Smith, and it had been disconcerting to find myself conversing with people who had been where I was now as the Doctor's old companions, but the knowledge that I was hearing a future Doctor talking with my <em>successor</em>…</p>
<p>I'd known that I couldn't travel with the Doctor forever, of course- if nothing else, he was virtually immortal and I was just human; sooner or later I would die even if I didn't decide to leave him on my own- but to hear this kind of <em>evidence </em>that I wasn't with him in the future…</p>
<p>"…<em>can hear you</em>," the voice was saying from the portal. "<em>Where are you</em>?"</p>
<p>"Where are we?" the other Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"England," I said.</p>
<p>"1562," the Doctor added.</p>
<p>"<em>Who are you talking to</em>?" the voice at the other end of the portal asked.</p>
<p>"Myself," the Doctors said simultaneously.</p>
<p>"<em>And</em> my old friend Bella Swan," the other Doctor added, giving me a brief warm smile that assured me that, whatever awaited me in the future, it wouldn't be a bad thing.</p>
<p>"<em>Can you come back through</em>?" another voice asked, this one sounding like an older woman.</p>
<p>"Physical passage may not be possible in both directions…" the other Doctor began, before trailing off as he took off the fez and studied it thoughtfully. "Hang on; fez incoming!"</p>
<p>With that, he threw the fez into the rupture, only to be met with silence until the first speaker spoke again. "<em>Nothing here</em>."</p>
<p>"So where did it go?" the Doctor asked, looking curiously at the other Doctor and I before he focused on his other self.</p>
<p>"<em>Who's he talking to</em>?" the first speaker said on the other end of the portal.</p>
<p>"<em>He said himself</em>," the other voice said contemplatively. "<em>Keep him talking</em>…"</p>
<p>As the faint sound of footsteps came through the rift, I wondered what I should say next, but the Doctor spoke before I could.</p>
<p>"OK," he said thoughtfully. "You used to be me, you've done all this before; what happens next?"</p>
<p>"I don't remember," the other Doctor said nonchalantly.</p>
<p>"How can you forget this?" the Doctor said, waving his finger indignantly between the two of them.</p>
<p>"Didn't you say you don't remember this kind of thing when it happens to you normally?" I said, looking at my Doctor while unable to resist the urge to smile at him.</p>
<p>"OK, never mind what we do and don't remember, I need to get back to my TARDIS!" the other Doctor protested as he pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "Let's get on with this; reverse the polarity!"</p>
<p>Following his future self's example, the Doctor took out his own sonic screwdriver and aimed it at the rupture, the two holding out their tools for a few moments with no sign that it was affecting the rupture.</p>
<p>"It's not working," the other Doctor said.</p>
<p>"We're both reversing the polarity," the Doctor noted in exasperation.</p>
<p>"Yes, I know that-" the other Doctor said.</p>
<p>"There's two of us," the Doctor clarified, slightly waving his sonic screwdriver. "I'm reversing it, and you're reversing it back again; we're <em>confusing</em> the polarity!"</p>
<p>The potential argument was interrupted when another whoosh filled the air and another figure emerged from the rupture. Unlike the other Doctor, this man landed on his feet with his hands behind his back and a casual smile on his face, to say nothing of him looking considerably older, with grey hair and a weathered face along with a sloppily-trimmed beard. He was wearing a battered leather jacket and a frayed scarf over light trousers and dark boots with missing buttons, a bandolier slung over his shoulders in a manner that reminded me of a Western gunfighter.</p>
<p>"Anyone lose a fez?" the man asked, smiling as he looked at the three of us before dropping the item in question at his feet.</p>
<p>"You…" the Doctor said, evidently shocked at the new arrival. "How can you be here? More to the point, <em>why </em>are you here?"</p>
<p>"Good afternoon," the old man said, smiling politely at us. "I'm looking for the Doctor."</p>
<p>"Well," the Doctor said, after exchanging glances with his future self, "you've certainly come to the right place."</p>
<p>"Good!" the old man said with a smile. "Right, well, who are you three? Oh, of course! Are you his companions?"</p>
<p>"His <em>companions</em>?" the other Doctor said incredulously, as the Doctor puffed out his cheeks and blew out in a contemplative manner.</p>
<p>"They get younger all the time!" the old man said, still smiling as he looked at the three of us. "Well, if you could point me in the general direction of the Doctor…"</p>
<p>As the two Doctors exchanged glances with each other, they reached into their jackets to pull out their sonic screwdrivers, looking uncomfortably at the older man.</p>
<p>"Really?" the old man said, clearly realising what they were trying to tell him</p>
<p>"Yeah," the other Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Really," the Doctor confirmed.</p>
<p>"You're me?" the old man asked. "Both of you?"</p>
<p>"Hold on; <em>you're </em>the Doctor?" I said incredulously.</p>
<p>"Yes…" the old man said, turning to look at me as though only just registering that I was there. "And you are?"</p>
<p>"Bella Swan," I answered, indicating my Doctor with an awkward wave of my hand. "I… I travel with him."</p>
<p>"Ah," the old man said, smiling slightly in relief before he focused his attention back on the Doctors with a more confused stare. "But… you're my <em>future selves</em>? Am I having a mid-life crisis?"</p>
<p>"Oi!" the two younger-looking Doctors said indignantly, raising their screwdrivers as the old man stepped forward.</p>
<p>"Why are you pointing your screwdrivers like that?" the old man asked. "They're scientific instruments, not water pistols. Look like you've seen a ghost!"</p>
<p>"Still…" the Doctor said, as he and his future self awkwardly lowered their screwdrivers, "loving the posh, gravelly thing; it's very convincing."</p>
<p>"Brave words, Dick Van Dyke," the other Doctor said. I was about to ask what he meant by that when a large group of soldiers suddenly charged from the woods to gather around us, all aiming lances at us as I hurried over to stand beside the Doctor as his other two selves looked anxiously at the new arrivals.</p>
<p>"Which of you is the Doctor?" one of the soldiers said, the two younger-looking Doctors brandishing their screwdrivers at the new arrivals while I tried to stand between them. "The Queen of England is bewitched; I would have the Doctor's head."</p>
<p>"Well," the old man said with a grim smile, "this has all the makings of your lucky day."</p>
<p>I wasn't sure if I agreed with that sentiment; having three Doctors present should normally be an advantage, but so far I was just completely confused about what was going on here…</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. The Doctor at War</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>For a moment, the guards and the Doctors were caught in a stand-off, the first two Doctors brandishing their screwdrivers while the older-looking third Doctor stood solemnly beside me, until a voice was heard through the portal once again.</p>
<p>"<em>I think there's three of them now</em>," the voice that was apparently the future Doctor's companion said.</p>
<p>"<em>There's a precedent for that</em>," the older-sounding woman replied.</p>
<p>"What is that?" the apparent leader of the soldiers said, stepping forward as the first two Doctors turned their screwdrivers towards him.</p>
<p>"Oh, the pointing again?" the old man who was apparently another Doctor said in exasperation. "They're <em>screwdrivers</em>! What are you going to do, assemble a cabinet at them?"</p>
<p>Exchanging glances with each other, the Doctors lowered their screwdrivers, exchanging embarrassed glances with each other.</p>
<p>"That thing," the lead soldier said, looking anxiously at the portal. "What witchcraft is it?"</p>
<p>"Ah yes!" the apparently oldest Doctor present said (The one that was apparently the youngest- since <em>both </em>of the other Doctors had been identified as his future selves- looked like the oldest and the one that was oldest looked younger than the others; if I'd thought it was hard to keep track of the Cullens' chronological ages, keeping track of which Doctor was what was giving me a headache), walking forward as he smiled up at the portal. "Now that you mention it, that is witchcraft, yes, yes, yes, witchy-witchcraft. Hello? Hello in there? Excuse me; hello! Am I talking to the wicked witch of the well? Clara?"</p>
<p>"<em>Hello</em>?" the future companion replied, sounding slightly frustrated at her new role.</p>
<p>"Clara, hi, hello," the future Doctor said, looking around at the soldiers. "Would you mind telling these prattling mortals to get themselves begone?"</p>
<p>"<em>What… he said</em>," the companion replied awkwardly.</p>
<p>"Yes, tiny bit more colour," the future Doctor said, looking up at the portal in frustration.</p>
<p>"<em>Right</em>," the companion said. "<em>Prattling mortals, off you pop, or I'll… turn you all into frogs</em>."</p>
<p>"Oh, frogs, nice," the Doctor said, as the leading soldier jumped. "You heard her."</p>
<p>"<em>Doctor, what's going on</em>?" the companion asked.</p>
<p>"It's a… timey-wimey thing," the Doctor said, looking awkwardly at the surrounding soldiers.</p>
<p>"Timey-wimey?" the older-looking Doctor said sceptically.</p>
<p>"I-I've no idea where he picks that stuff up," the Doctor said, so obviously embarrassed at the phrase that I would have used the opportunity to make a joke about it in a less serious situation.</p>
<p>Further conversation was interrupted when one of the Elizabeths suddenly returned to the clearing, prompting the soldiers to kneel in homage even as the Doctors remained standing (I thought about kneeling for a moment, but decided to follow the Doctors' example and stay on both feet).</p>
<p>"You don't seem to be kneeling," the Elizabeth said, looking at us in satisfaction. "How tremendously brave of you."</p>
<p>"Which one are you?" the Doctor asked. "What happened to the other one?"</p>
<p>"Indisposed," Elizabeth said confidently. "Long live the Queen!"</p>
<p>"Long live the Queen!" the soldiers repeated.</p>
<p>"Arrest these men," the Elizabeth said coldly. "Take them to the Tower."</p>
<p>"That is <em>not </em>the Queen of England; that is an alien duplicate!" the Doctor yelled, pointing firmly at Elizabeth.</p>
<p>"And you can take it from him, 'cause he's really checked," the future Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Oh, shut up!" the Doctor protested, leaving me to stare up in frustration at my friend's attitude.</p>
<p>"Venom sacs in the tongue," the future Doctor added.</p>
<p>"Seriously, stop it!" the Doctor said, lowering his arm to glare at his future self (How someone could be this annoyed at themselves I really couldn't understand…).</p>
<p>"No, hang on, the Tower!" the future Doctor said, suddenly grinning. "Did you say the Tower? Ah, yes, brilliant, love the Tower! Breakfast at eight, please. Will there be Wi-Fi?"</p>
<p>"Are you capable of speaking without flapping your hands about?" the oldest-looking Doctor asked grimly.</p>
<p>"Yes! No!" the younger-looking Doctor said, waving his hands as he spoke before he turned to look resolutely at the Elizabeth. "I demand to be incarcerated in the Tower immediately with my co-conspirators, Sandshoes, Grandad and the Swan!"</p>
<p>"Grandad?" the oldest-looking Doctor said indignantly.</p>
<p>"'The Swan'?" I repeated uncertainly.</p>
<p>"They're not sandshoes!" the Doctor protested.</p>
<p>"Yes they are," the oldest-looking Doctor noted, glancing down at the Doctor's shoes.</p>
<p>"Silence!" Elizabeth said. "The Tower is not to be taken lightly; very few emerge again."</p>
<p>"Well then," the future Doctor said with a grin, "best be getting us there, mmm?"</p>
<p>I didn't know if I should feel gratified or anxious at this turn of events; the future Doctor seemed to have a plan, but I had no idea if it would turn out to be a good one or not…</p><hr/><p>A few minutes later, the four of were manacled and being led back to the Tower of London by the soldiers, leaving me with nothing better to do but hope that we wouldn't have too far to walk as I found myself walking alongside the future Doctor, while my Doctor was walking with the oldest-looking man.<br/><br/>"So," the apparently future Doctor said, looking at me with a reassuring grin, "good to see you again, Bella Swan."<br/><br/>"Uh… sure," I said, lost for any better response as I looked uncertainly at the man that I was still only just starting to believe was the Doctor. "So… you're the Doctor?"<br/><br/>"The Eleventh Doctor, to be precise," the man said, grinning casually at me. "And your one's the Tenth; don't know if he's mentioned that yet?"<br/><br/>"He… he <em>might </em>have…" I said, trying to remember before dismissing the issue as irrelevant; it didn't matter if the Doctor had ever told me what body he was in right now on top of everything else we had to deal with. "So… you're the next one?"<br/><br/>"Precisely," the Doctor smiled at me.<br/><br/>"And… him?" I asked, looking uncertainly at the old man, only for the Eleventh Doctor's expression to suddenly become far grimmer at that question.<br/><br/>"That's… complicated," he said solemnly.<br/><br/>"How?" I asked.<br/><br/>"I've had many faces, many lives," the Eleventh Doctor explained, his tone grim as we continued to walk. "I don't admit to all them, there's one life I've tried very hard to forget… and that's <em>him</em>; the me who fought in the Time War."<br/><br/>"Ah," I said, looking at the old man with a new sense of understanding; considering the Doctor's reluctance to remember the Time War, facing the incarnation who'd actually fought in it had to be difficult…<br/><br/>"So… which Doctor is he?" I asked, getting my mind back on the most relevant question.<br/><br/>"He isn't," the Eleventh Doctor said.<br/><br/>"Pardon?" I asked, completely confused about what the Doctor was saying.<br/><br/>"He's <em>me</em>, but he's not <em>the Doctor</em>; he broke the promise we made when we chose that name," the Eleventh Doctor explained grimly. "He accepted other Time Lords calling him 'Doctor' because he didn't have anything else they could call him instead, but he never considered himself the Doctor, and neither did any of us; his predecessor was the Eighth Doctor, he was followed by the Ninth, but <em>he</em> is nothing but a soldier."<br/><br/>"But… he's still <em>you</em>, right?" I said, struck by the Doctor's tone as he discussed this man. "How bad could he-?"<br/><br/>"'Doctor no more'," the Eleventh Doctor said grimly, his gaze fixed on the old man up ahead as he spoke. "Those were his first words after the death of his predecessor, and he lived up to them throughout his life; by the end of the Time War, that man had more blood on his hands than any other soldier in that long war, and that man was me…"<br/><br/>I was lost for anything I could say as I looked at the old man up ahead of me.<br/><br/>How could the Doctor have become a soldier on <em>that </em>scale?<br/><br/>"It wasn't as bad as you might think," the Eleventh Doctor said, as though he'd noticed my expression. "He never killed innocents, he always did his best to find another way if he was asked to carry out a mission that would risk civilian casualties, and I'm not saying he ended the war that way because he wanted to or because he enjoyed it… but what he did was not done in the name of the Doctor."<br/><br/>With nothing else to say to that statement, I simply walked in silence as I continued to stare at the old man walking alongside my friend.<br/><br/>I wasn't sure what baffled me more; how the Doctor could hate one of his other selves so much that he wouldn't even consider that version of himself to be 'the Doctor', or what all three of them were doing here…</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Four in the Cell</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Now that Bella knows which Doctor is which, she'll be referring to the War Doctor and the Eleventh Doctor as such, although the Tenth Doctor will just be 'the Doctor' as he's the one she's actually travelling with</p>
<p>Just to confirm, the Interface for the Moment is still present, but since only the War Doctor can see it and this story's written from Bella's POV, the Interface's lines aren't included.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Aside from my talk with the Eleventh Doctor, I didn't manage to get much else out of any of the Time Lords as we made our way to the Tower. Even after the Eleventh Doctor and I were moved forward to rejoin the other two Doctors, the conversation mainly consisted of the older Doctors defending their choice of attire and appearance while the old man I was starting to think of as 'the War Doctor' brooded over his future attitude, the conversation only being interrupted when we marched down to the Tower of London's cellar and left in a dungeon.</p>
<p>As the guard closed the cell door behind us, the Doctor grimly took in our new surroundings as the War Doctor carried out a scan with his own sonic screwdriver, leaving the Eleventh Doctor to study our surroundings and pick up a nail of some sort from the straw-covered floor.</p>
<p>"Three of us in one cell," the Doctor said, looking grimly at our surroundings. "That's going to cause some nasty anomalies if we don't get out soon… What are you doing?"</p>
<p>"Getting us out," the Eleventh Doctor replied, before he continued scratching away at a brick on one wall with the nail he'd just picked up.</p>
<p>Lost for what he hoped to accomplish with that, I turned to look at the door, noting that the War Doctor was already scanning it with a thin rod that was presumably his own version of the sonic screwdriver.</p>
<p>"The sonic won't work on that," the Doctor said, looking at the old man in exasperation. "It's too primitive."</p>
<p>"Shall we ask for a better quality of door so we can escape?" the Eleventh Doctor asked, smiling at the old man before returning to his work.</p>
<p>"It really can't handle something like that?" I asked, looking between the door and the Doctors in surprise. "You've gotten out of more advanced cells than this…"</p>
<p>"Simplicity has its own defence," the Doctor said simply, pacing around the column that his future self was scratching at before he turned to address the other two Doctors. "OK, so the Queen of England is now a Zygon, but never mind that, why are we all together? Why are we all here?"</p>
<p>Following his gaze, I realised that he was looking at the War Doctor in a very probing manner, the older-looking Doctor turning back to look curiously at his future selves.</p>
<p>"Well, me and...Chinny, we were surprised," the Doctor clarified, indicating his future self. "But you came looking for us; you knew it was going to happen. Who told you?"</p>
<p>"'Chinny'?" the Eleventh Doctor said, looking indignantly at his past self.</p>
<p>"Yeah, you do have a chin," the Doctor noted.</p>
<p>Ignoring his future selves' conversation, the War Doctor just stared silently at them before he turned back to the door, his manner making it clear that he wasn't going to answer that question.</p>
<p>"In theory," he said, reinforcing his refusal to answer the earlier question, "I could trigger an isolated sonic shift among the molecules, and the door should disintegrate."</p>
<p>"Really?" I said, smiling hopefully at the War Doctor. "That's-"</p>
<p>"Not practical; it would take years for even the sonic to calculate the exact sub-harmonic resonance of the whole door," the Doctor corrected.</p>
<p>"Actually, it would be centuries…" the War Doctor said, sitting down on a nearby bench with a weary sigh. "Well, we might as well get started; help to pass the timey-wimey… and do you have to talk like children? What is it that makes you so ashamed of being a grown-up?"</p>
<p>It was something I'd never really thought about- I'd always considered that the Doctor just enjoyed joking around so that he could have more fun- but as the two Doctors looked at the War Doctor, I suddenly wondered if he was the reason they were afraid of being 'adults'…</p>
<p>"Oh, the way you both look at me," the War Doctor said, shaking his head as he looked questioningly at them. "What is that? I'm trying to think of a better word than 'dread'."</p>
<p>"It must be really recent for you," the Doctor said at last.</p>
<p>"Recent?" the War Doctor repeated.</p>
<p>"The Time War, the last day," the Eleventh Doctor clarified. "The day you killed them all."</p>
<p>"The day <em>we </em>killed them all," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Same thing," the Eleventh Doctor said, leaving the Doctor to walk off to the side.</p>
<p>"I don't talk about it," the War Doctor said.</p>
<p>"You're not talking about it," the Doctor said. "The only other person here is Bella, and she won't say anything."</p>
<p>The War Doctor gave me a brief smile at that vote of confidence before he fell back into silence, staring ahead of himself for a moment before he spoke again.</p>
<p>"Do you ever count?"</p>
<p>"Count what?" the Eleventh Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"How many children there were on Gallifrey that day."</p>
<p>Children…</p>
<p>It was something I'd never really thought about- from what the Doctor had told me of Gallifreyian society, it was hard to think about what their children would have been like- but now that the War Doctor had brought it up, I suddenly couldn't get the image out of my head.</p>
<p>All those children who must have burned when the Doctor destroyed his world…</p>
<p>"I have absolutely no idea," the Eleventh Doctor said, pausing in his scratches for a moment before he started his work again.</p>
<p>"How old are you now?"</p>
<p>"Ah… I don't know; I lose track," the Eleventh Doctor said dismissively. "Twelve hundred and something, I think, unless I'm lying. I can't remember if I'm lying about my age - that's how old I am."</p>
<p>"Four hundred years older than me… and in all that time, you've never even wondered how many there were?" the War Doctor said (I didn't think that was accurate, based on some of the things the Doctor had said about his age and past, but this wasn't the time to argue about dates). "You never once counted?"</p>
<p>In an unexpectedly violent move from a Doctor, the Eleventh Doctor's arm jerked away from the wall he was scratching at as though he'd been stung, before he turned to look at his younger self.</p>
<p>"Tell me," he said grimly, "what would be the point?"</p>
<p>"Two point four seven billion," the Doctor interjected grimly.</p>
<p>"Oh my God…" I said, the words slipping out before I could stop myself.</p>
<p>The Doctor had killed that many <em>children</em>?</p>
<p>I knew that he'd only done it because he'd been convinced that he had no choice, but still… all those children…</p>
<p>"You did count!" the War Doctor said, as the Eleventh returned to whatever he was scratching on the wall.</p>
<p>"You forgot?" the Doctor said, looking indignantly at his future self. "Four hundred years; is that all it takes?"</p>
<p>"I moved on," the Eleventh Doctor said grimly, halting his scratches as he turned to face his past self.</p>
<p>"Where?" the Doctor asked indignantly. "Where can you be now that you can forget something like that?"</p>
<p>"Spoilers," the Eleventh Doctor countered in a low tone.</p>
<p>"No," the Doctor retorted with a firm shake of his head. "No, no, for once I would like to know where I'm going-"</p>
<p>"No, you really wouldn't!" the Doctor countered, the two Doctors staring silently at each other for a moment.</p>
<p>"I don't know who you are," the War Doctor said, breaking the tense silence. "Either of you. I haven't got the faintest idea."</p>
<p>Neither Doctor voiced a reply to the War Doctor's words, with the Eleventh Doctor simply continuing to scratch his message as the Doctor stared at him in horror before walking away himself.</p>
<p>"No," the War Doctor said suddenly.</p>
<p>"What?" I said looking at him in confusion.</p>
<p>"Just… no," the War Doctor said once again.</p>
<p>The Eleventh Doctor suddenly stopped scratching as he leant against the wall, chuckling to himself.</p>
<p>"Is something funny?" the Doctor asked. "Did I miss a funny thing?"</p>
<p>"Sorry," the Eleventh Doctor said, scratching his head with the nail. "It just occurred to me; this is what I'm like when I'm alone… except that Bella's here, of course."</p>
<p>I had no idea what the Doctor meant by that, if it was meant to be a compliment or a criticism, but I decided not to over-analyse it; this was far from the time to start trying to analyse a future version of the Doctor, and he didn't seem to be annoyed at my presence anyway…</p>
<p>"Four hundred years," the War Doctor said suddenly, looking at the Doctor as he tossed the sonic screwdriver into the air.</p>
<p>"Sorry?" the Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"At a software level, they're all the same device, aren't they?" the War Doctor said, holding out his own sonic screwdriver. "Same software, different case."</p>
<p>"Yeah…" the Doctor said. "So?"</p>
<p>"So," the War Doctor continued, the Eleventh Doctor halting his scratches and taking out his own sonic screwdriver as the old man turned to the door once again, "it would take centuries for the screwdriver to calculate how to disintegrate the door…"</p>
<p>He ran his own sonic screwdriver over the door as he continued speaking. "Scanning the door, implanting the calculation as a permanent subroutine in the software architecture… and, if you really are me, with your sandshoes and your dicky bow, and that screwdriver is still mine... that calculation is still going on."</p>
<p>It was so simple yet complicated I was amazed it had taken us this long to work it out; we'd been acting like we were stuck, when he had four hundred years to prepare the tools we needed for our escape…</p>
<p>"Yeah," the Doctor said, holding his screwdriver up to his ear. "Still going."</p>
<p>"Calculation complete," the Eleventh Doctor said, holding his own screwdriver up to his ear as he grinned at his other selves. "Four hundred years in four seconds; we may have our differences- which is frankly odd in the circumstances- but I tell you what, boys, we are incredibly clever!"</p>
<p>The moment was interrupted when the door suddenly opened and a short young woman came in, wearing a black leather jacket and a short but loose red skirt underneath.</p>
<p>"Hhhhow did you do that?" the Eleventh Doctor asked, clearly recognising the woman.</p>
<p>"It wasn't locked," the young woman said, her voice confirming her identity as the 'Clara' the Eleventh Doctor had spoken to earlier through the portal.</p>
<p>"Right," the Doctor said, voicing our mutual embarrassment at that revelation; this was worse than when I'd fallen for James's trap…</p>
<p>"So these two are you, then?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"Yes," the Eleventh Doctor said, indicating the other two Doctors. "You've met them before, don't you remember?"</p>
<p>"A bit," Clara said, before smiling at the Doctor. "Nice suit."</p>
<p>"Thanks," the Doctor said, putting his sonic away and indicating me. "This is Bella Swan; she travels with me."</p>
<p>"Hi," I said, nodding awkwardly at the older woman.</p>
<p>"Hi," Clara replied, shaking my hand before she looked around the room. "Hang on… three of <em>you</em> in one cell and none of you thought to try the door?"</p>
<p>"Well… who doesn't lock an occupied cell?" I asked, shrugging uncertainly as I tried to defend our mistake.</p>
<p>"Yes, exactly!" the Eleventh Doctor said. "Why wasn't it locked?"</p>
<p>"Because I was fascinated to see what you would do upon escaping," Queen Elizabeth- the <em>Zygon </em>Queen Elizabeth, I reminded myself- said as she suddenly walked into the cell, looking around at us with an overly satisfied smirk. "I understand you're rather fond of this world. It's time I think you saw what's going to happen to it."</p>
<p>Exchanging glances with Clara and the Doctors, I resigned myself to the fact that we had no better strategy right now and walked off after the fake Queen; with three Doctors available, it couldn't take <em>that </em>long to come up with some kind of strategy to use the Zygons' arrogance against them and save the world…</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. To the Archive</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After following the Queen for a few moments, we finally found ourselves standing on a balcony looking out at a large stone room, filled with Zygons working on all kinds of strange machinery. I tried to see if I could work out what we were looking at, but quickly gave it up as a bad job; I might travel with the Doctor, but I was no scientist, and what was laid out before us looked more like weird modern art than technology.</p>
<p>"The Zygons lost their own world," the Elizabeth-Zygon explained in an imperious tone. "It burned in the first days of the Time War. A new home is required."</p>
<p>"So they want this one?" Clara asked, interrupting me before I could ask the question myself; the Doctor had only briefly discussed his history with the Zygons, but I was fairly sure their world had been destroyed by some kind of invasion, unless this was another example of the Time War affecting history…</p>
<p>"Not yet," the Elizabeth-Zygon continued dismissively. "Far too primitive. Zygons are used to a certain level of comfort."</p>
<p>I wasn't sure how to feel about the implication that we weren't good enough for someone to invade yet, but when a Zygon was directed towards a strange glass cube resting on a nearby pedestal, I soon decided that I had more things to focus on as Elizabeth directed our attention to the object in question. As we watched, the Zygon placed its hand on the cube, there was a strange whirring sound, and the cube seemed to <em>absorb </em>the Zygon before reappearing in the painting on the wall near it.</p>
<p>"The Zygons are… going into a painting?" I said, wondering if this was some strange <em>Picture of Dorian Gray</em>-esque thing.</p>
<p>"It's not a picture, it's a stasis cube," the War Doctor explained. "Time Lord art; frozen instants in time, bigger on the inside, but could be deployed as…"</p>
<p>"Suspended animation," the Doctor finished, his next self snapping his fingers in agreement. "Oh, that's very good. The Zygons all pop inside the pictures, wait a few centuries till the planet's a bit more interesting, and then out they come."</p>
<p>"You see, Clara, Bella," the Eleventh Doctor continued, walking up to me and my fellow companion/future successor, "they're stored in the paintings in the Under Gallery, like Cup-a-Soups. Except you add time, if you can picture that- nobody could picture that- forget I said Cup-a-Soups."</p>
<p>"Under-Gallery?" I repeated.</p>
<p>"A secret gallery where the royal family keep all art that was thought to be too dangerous for the public," Clara explained. "We were investigating broken paintings in the Under-Gallery in 2013 when all this happened, and… well, here we are."</p>
<p>"They waited in there for… what, four hundred and fifty years?" I said, looking uncertainly at the painting; I couldn't remember the exact date we were at right now, but that sounded about right.</p>
<p>"For them, it would be instantaneous," the War Doctor explained. "They probably knew when to aim for anyway; this kind of time technology must have come with a time machine that would give some idea where they wanted to go, but it probably burnt out after taking them here by accident."</p>
<p>"Ah," I nodded in understanding.</p>
<p>"And do you know why I know that you're a <em>fake</em>?" the Doctor said, turning to glare at the Zygon-Elizabeth. "Because you're such a bad copy. It's not just the smell, or the unconvincing hair, or the atrocious teeth, or the eyes just a bit too close together, or the breath that could stun a horse; it's because my Elizabeth, the real Elizabeth, would never be stupid enough to reveal her own plan. Honestly, why would you do that?"</p>
<p>"Because it's not my plan," the Zygon-Elizabeth said confidently, "and I <em>am </em>the real Elizabeth."</p>
<p>"Right…" the Doctor said, looking suddenly awkward at his mistake as I suddenly wondered if I should laugh or feel embarrassed. "So… backtracking a moment, just to lend some context to my earlier remarks…"</p>
<p>"My twin is dead in the forest," Elizabeth- the <em>real </em>Elizabeth- explained as she lifted her skirt to reveal a jewelled dagger in her garter belt. "I am accustomed to taking precautions. These Zygon creatures never even considered that it was me who survived, rather than their own commander. The arrogance that typifies their kind."</p>
<p>"Zygons?" Clara and I asked at once.</p>
<p>"Men!" Elizabeth clarified.</p>
<p>"And you killed one with that?" I asked in surprise.</p>
<p>"I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but at the time, so did the Zygon," Elizabeth said, before she turned to face the Doctor. "The future of my kingdom is imperilled. Doctor, can I rely on your service?"</p>
<p>"Well, I'm going to need my TARDIS," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"It has been procured already," Elizabeth said, prompting a grateful smile from the Doctor. "But first, my love, you have a promise to keep."</p><hr/><p>I had dealt with a lot of strange and unexpected things since I started travelling with the Doctor, but finding myself attending the wedding of Queen Elizabeth I to a time-traveling alien was definitely an unexpected twist even if said alien hadn't been my friend and 'teacher'. The ceremony itself was fairly simple, just being overseen by a minister who gave the impression that even he was surprised to be here, with Clara and I acting as impromptu 'bridesmaids' while the Eleventh Doctor and the War Doctor stood off to the other side as the Doctor's 'best men', but this was still a strangely historical moment by any standard.<br/><br/>As the minister proclaimed the Doctor and Elizabeth to be man and wife, Elizabeth pulled the Doctor in for a passionate kiss while Clara tossed petals into the air with a broad smile, leaving him to awkwardly return the kiss while the other two Doctors looked uncertainly at their past/future self. Just as the kiss was starting to get awkwardly long, the Doctor pulled away and hurried for the TARDIS, the rest of us hurrying after him as he entered the ship.<br/><br/>For a moment, as I took in the familiar sight of the TARDIS interior, I could almost believe that things were back to normal…<br/><br/>"You've let this place go a bit!" the War Doctor said, taking in the console room with a critical eye as the other two Doctors walked in after him.<br/><br/>"Ah, it's his grunge phase," the Eleventh Doctor said dismissively. "He grows out of it."<br/><br/>"Don't you listen to them!" the Doctor said, patting the console reassuringly before an alarm suddenly blared and the room suddenly seemed to shrink as the walls became a bright white, lit with roundels that reminded me of what I'd seen of the First Doctor's TARDIS console room. "Oh; desktop's glitching!"<br/><br/>"Three of us from different time zones," the War Doctor noted. "It's trying to compensate."<br/><br/>"Hey, look, the round things!" the Eleventh Doctor said, indicating the walls with a grin.<br/><br/>"I love the round things," the Doctor said with a broad grin.<br/><br/>"What are the round things?"<br/><br/>"No idea."<br/><br/>I was about to mention that the First Doctor had called the 'round things' roundels- not that it meant much to me, but the point was still valid- but was interrupted by a sudden shrill whistling sound from the console, prompting the Eleventh Doctor to hurry over to it.<br/><br/>"Oh dear, the friction contrafibulator," he said, flipping a switch as the TARDIS shifted around us once again, this time turning into a larger room illuminated by a blue light, with three different levels and a console that struck me as far more professional than the last couple, as though it had been assembled over time rather than just sticking things together.<br/><br/>"Ha!" the Eleventh Doctor grinned. "There! Stabilised!"<br/><br/>"Oh, you've redecorated," the Doctor said, smiling as he studied the room.<br/><br/>"Hold on; this is <em>your </em>console?" I asked the Eleventh Doctor curiously.<br/><br/>"Precisely," the Eleventh Doctor said with a broad grin. "She archives the ones that haven't actually happened yet as well as the ones I've already used-"<br/><br/>"I don't like this," the Doctor said critically.<br/><br/>"Oh?" the Eleventh Doctor said, his grin faltering as he looked indignantly at the other two Doctors. "Oh yeah; oh, you never do! Listen, we're going to the National Gallery; the Zygons are underneath it."<br/><br/>"No," Clara corrected. "UNIT HQ; they followed us there to the Black Archive."<br/><br/>I had never heard that name before, but judging by the way the three Doctors turned to look at Clara, it couldn't be good.<br/><br/>"OK...so you've heard of that, then," Clara said awkwardly.<br/><br/>"Uh… I haven't," I put in, raising a hand uncomfortably. "What is it?"<br/><br/>"Every bit of alien technology humanity shouldn't have kept," the Doctor explained grimly. "Even I'm not officially meant to know about it, but the Brigadier told me about it once, just in case."<br/><br/>"We left it alone because we trusted Alastair to keep an eye on things…" the War Doctor began.<br/><br/>"But he's dead in the time we came from," the Eleventh Doctor finished grimly.<br/><br/>Even though I'd only met him briefly, the thought of the Brigadier being dead suddenly made me feel sad, as I thought of that strong, vibrant man, so dedicated to his friend no matter what face the Doctor was wearing at the time, now silent and gone for good…<br/><br/>"If the Brigadier's… gone," the Doctor said, swallowing slightly as he looked at the rest of us, "that means that the space-time telegraph's most likely been moved to the Archive; it's the safest place for it, and Alastair would know that."<br/><br/>"The space-time telegraph?" Clara repeated.<br/><br/>"A device I gave Alastair so that he could call me if he needed my help," the Eleventh Doctor explained, reaching over to activate something on the console as the other two Doctors tapped in what looked like coordinates. "Just give me a moment; I need to turn this on silently…"<br/><br/>"What's the problem?" I asked.<br/><br/>"If the Zygons are in the Black Archive, standing orders are to order the facility to self-destruct by setting off a nuclear warhead capable of blowing up all of London," the Doctor answered for his future self.<br/><br/>"Oh," I said, lost for anything better to say at that prospect.<br/><br/>"<em>You would destroy London</em>?" a voice said from the TARDIS console, just as the Eleventh Doctor stepped back from the controls.<br/><br/>"<em>To save the world</em>?" the same voice replied. "<em>Yes, I would</em>."<br/><br/>"<em>You're bluffing</em>," the voice replied to itself (I was guessing that the first speaker was a Zygon, but I wondered who it was impersonating).<br/><br/>"<em>You really think so</em>?" the woman said. "<em>Somewhere in your memory is a man called Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart. I'm his daughter</em>."<br/><br/>"'Science leads', Kate!" the Eleventh Doctor suddenly said, leaning over to address the console himself. "Is that what you meant? Is this what your father meant?"<br/><br/>"<em>Doctor</em>?" the woman said.<br/><br/>"Space-Time Telegraph, Kate; a gift from me to your father, hotline straight to the TARDIS," the Eleventh Doctor explained. "I <em>know </em>about the Black Archive and I know about the security protocol; Kate, please, <em>please</em>, tell me you are not about to do something unbelievably <em>stupid</em>!"<br/><br/>"<em>I'm sorry, Doctor</em>," the woman said, sounding slightly tearful as she spoke. "<em>Switch it off</em>."<br/><br/>"Not as sorry as you'll be," the Doctor said, exchanging grim glances with his future self as they stood on either side of the console. "This is not a decision you will ever be able to live with!"<br/><br/>The TARDIS suddenly shook around us as the Eleventh Doctor frantically turned his attention back to the controls, leaving Clara and I trying to hold on to the sides as the three Doctors studied the console.<br/><br/>"Kate!" the Eleventh Doctor yelled. "We're trying to bring the TARDIS in; why can't we land?"<br/><br/>"<em>I said switch it off</em>!" the woman said.<br/><br/>"No, Kate, please, just listen to me…!" the Eleventh Doctor said, as a sudden beep filled the room that reminded me of a terminated phone call. "The Tower of London; totally TARDIS-proof."<br/><br/>"How can they do that?" Clara asked.<br/><br/>"Alien technology plus human stupidity," the Eleventh Doctor said grimly. "Trust me; it's unbeatable."<br/><br/>"We don't need to land," the War Doctor said suddenly, grinning in inspiration.<br/><br/>"Yeeeeah, we do, tiny bit," the Doctor said, looking sceptically at his younger self. "Try and keep up."<br/><br/>"No, we don't, we don't," the War Doctor said, as he reached over to pick up a stasis cube that he'd left on the console earlier. "There is another way… Cup-a-Soup!"<br/><br/>I didn't entirely understand the analogy, but judging by the smiles on the other two Doctors' faces, it was clear that they at least followed what their past self was thinking about…</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. The Treaty</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The next few hours were a rush of activity as the Doctors, Clara and I raced to make arrangements to get us into the Black Archive. With the Space-Time Telegraph connection having allowed us to establish at least an approximate time that we had to be there for- we wanted to arrive after our conversation but before the nuclear bomb could detonate- and the Eleventh Doctor claiming to know of a suitable painting that we could project ourselves into, all we had to do was let the Eleventh Doctor make a phone call while the other two Doctors made the necessary calculations on how to get us out at the right time.</p>
<p>After that, we left the TARDIS parked outside the Tower of London, hurried up to a moving van that was just driving up, and then the Doctors used the stasis cube we'd acquired from the Zygons in order to transfer ourselves into a portrait that the Eleventh Doctor had identified as the 'Fall of Arcadia', apparently a picture of the last day of the Time War.</p>
<p>I didn't actually remember anything happening after that- as far as I could recall, the cube generated a blue light over me and that was that- but the next thing I remembered was seeing the three Doctors walking forward after blasting a Dalek away with their sonic screwdrivers as we stood in a damaged courtyard. With the Doctors already on the move, Clara and I were left to hurry after them as they emerged from what looked like a window into an underground room filled with all kind of boxes and seemingly alien artefacts, facing a table surrounding by two identical copies of the same three people; two blonde women in dark coats, two men with receding hairlines in lab coats, and two women wearing lab coats, glasses, and long scarves.</p>
<p>"Hello," the War Doctor said solemnly.</p>
<p>"I'm the Doctor," the Doctor continued.</p>
<p>"Sorry about the Dalek," the Eleventh Doctor added, indicating the Dalek that they had blasted out of the painting.</p>
<p>"Also the showing-off…" Clara mused, as she and I climbed out of the painting after them.</p>
<p>"Kate Lethbridge-Stewart," the Eleventh Doctor said, taking the lead as he walked over to confront one of the blonde women, "what in the same of sanity are you <em>doing</em>?"</p>
<p>"The countdown can only be halted at my personal command," the blonde woman's identical twin on the other side of the table said grimly. "There's nothing you can do."</p>
<p>"Except," the Doctor added as he walked over, "make you both agree to halt it."</p>
<p>"Not even for three of you," the blonde said, looking between the two Doctors.</p>
<p>"You're about to murder millions of people-" the War Doctor began.</p>
<p>"To save billions," the blonde countered firmly. "How many times have you made that calculation?"</p>
<p>"Once," the Eleventh Doctor said. "Turned me into the man I am now… not even sure who that is any more."</p>
<p>"You tell yourself it's justified, but it's a lie," the Doctor said, walking up to stand grimly at the head of the table as he looked between the two women. "Because what I did that day was wrong… just wrong."</p>
<p>I thought about trying to say something to comfort him, but decided against it when I saw a digital clock counting down behind him, if that referred to how long we had until the bomb went off, the Doctors would need every second they had left to save us all…</p>
<p>"And," the Eleventh Doctor added, walking over to join his past self, "because I got it wrong… I'm going to make <em>you </em>get it right."</p>
<p>"How?" Kate asked, as the two Doctors pulled two wheeled chairs over from either side of the table and sat down, propping their feet up and crossing their arms as they looked at the three doubles.</p>
<p>"Any second now," the Doctor said, pointing at the two Kates, "you're going to stop that countdown, both of you, together."</p>
<p>"Then you're going to negotiate the most perfect treaty of all time," the Eleventh Doctor continued.</p>
<p>"Safeguards all round, completely fair on both sides," the Doctor noted as he leaned over to his other self.</p>
<p>"And the key to perfect negotiation?" the Eleventh Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"Not knowing which side you're on," the Doctor noted.</p>
<p>"So," the Eleventh Doctor continued, as the two Time Lords pushed themselves back from the table and stood up, pulling out their sonic screwdrivers as they spoke, "for the next few hours, until we decide to let you out…"</p>
<p>"No-one in this room will be able to remember whether they're human…" the Doctor added.</p>
<p>"Or Zygon," the Eleventh Doctor finished. "Whoops-a-daisy!"</p>
<p>"Allons-y!" the Doctor said, as both men leapt on to the table and aimed their sonic screwdrivers at a device on the wall. Glancing over, I saw the War Doctor had pulled out his own sonic screwdriver and was holding it up with a broad grin, before the device they were pointing it at generated a series of sparks, filling the room with a brilliant burst of white light that suddenly faded away. As I watched, the two Kates looked at each other with a sudden sense of shock, before they each turned to face a digital clock I hadn't noticed earlier.</p>
<p>"<em>Cancel the detonation</em>!" they both said at the same time, the clock halting as soon as they finished speaking.</p>
<p>"Peace in our time," the Eleventh Doctor grinned, looking back at the Zygons and humans standing around us.</p>
<p>"Now," the Doctor said, looking over at the assembled doubles, "shall we get started?"</p><hr/><p>As the two older Doctors set to work on drawing up the previously-discussed peace treaty, accompanied by the two Kates and the two men in lab coats, it soon became clear that there was nothing that Clara and I could do but stand off to the side as they talked. The other two women in glasses were standing off to the side of the table, casually talking about something that I couldn't hear, leaving me to walk around the Black Archive as I took in its contents, which ranged from assorted advanced forms of weaponry to a robotic head, or a pair of red-heeled shoes and a table that looked like it had been used as a desk in the seventies and never been replaced.<br/><br/>On a personal level, the thing that fascinated me most was a large billboard near the middle of the room, which displayed, among other things, a series of photographs. Once I recognised one as a black-and-white image of the Brigadier- as well as another photo of him with grey hair and having put on significantly more weight- it didn't take long to recognise Sergeant Benton in another black-and-white image standing beside a young woman in seventies attire, reinforcing my theory that I was looking at pictures of the Doctor's other companions. Looking over the display, I saw a surprising variety of people on the board, including a young woman in what looked like a Victorian gown, another young woman in a dark toga, a young man in a sailor's outfit, Benton standing beside a young woman wearing what looked like a stereotypical cave-person's leather attire, another photo I recognised as a younger Sarah Jane Smith alongside Benton and Harry Sullivan…<br/><br/>My eyes widened as I saw one of the photographs in particular.<br/><br/>It wasn't just the sight of me with short hair in a leather jacket- I had already established that this was the future based on when I left with the Doctor, so it was almost a relief to see evidence that I was going to go home in my future, and the new look seemed to work for me- but it was who was with me that really shocked me. The photograph had apparently been taken from a distance during a day out, as it showed me sitting under a shaded tree as I talked with another couple and a three-year-old boy…<br/><br/>The fact that the couple were Emmett and Rosalie was something I was actually glad to see- even if I didn't like who I'd been with Edward when I looked back on my time in Forks, I still appreciated them as friends- but when I realised that the boy with us looked like he could be their son, I had no idea what to think.<br/><br/>Emmett and Rosalie would make interesting parents, I had no doubt, but they couldn't even <em>have </em>children…<br/><br/>As someone walked past me, I turned around to see Clara walking over to the War Doctor as he sat solemnly in a nearby chair, a cup and saucer of tea in his hands, and it didn't take long for me to decide to join them; it had to be more interesting than pondering the mysteries of my future.<br/><br/>"Hello," Clara said, looking uncertainly at the old man.<br/><br/>"Hello," the War Doctor responded<br/><br/>"I'm Clara," the other woman said, sitting down in another chair in front of him. "We haven't really met yet."<br/><br/>"I look forward to it," the War Doctor, before looking over at me as I walked up to join Clara. "And the same for you."<br/><br/>"Uh… thanks," I said, smiling slightly at him out of a lack of anything else to say.<br/><br/>"Is there a problem?" the War Doctor asked, looking curiously at Clara as she continued to study him in silence.<br/><br/>"The Doctor- my… my Doctor," Clara clarified. "He's always talking about the day he did it… the day he wiped out the Time Lords to stop the war…"<br/><br/>"And mine brings it up as well," I added.<br/><br/>"One would," the War Doctor mused.<br/><br/>"You wouldn't," Clara said. "Because you haven't done it yet. It's still in your future."<br/><br/>"What?" I said, looking at the oldest-looking Doctor in shock, as he stared back at Clara.<br/><br/>The other two Doctors had spent so much time accusing this Doctor of Gallifrey's destruction… and he hadn't even <em>done </em>it yet?<br/><br/>"You're very sure of yourself," the War Doctor noted.<br/><br/>"He regrets it," Clara continued. "I see it in his eyes every day. He'd do anything to change it."<br/><br/>"Including saving all these people?" the War Doctor asked, his expression thoughtful. "How many worlds has his regret saved, do you think? Look over there… humans and Zygons, working together in peace. How did you know?"<br/><br/>"Your eyes," Clara said with a slight smile. "You're so much younger."<br/><br/>Now that I looked more closely at the War Doctor, I realised what Clara was talking about; there was a weight in his expression, but it wasn't the sense of guilt I was used to seeing haunting the Doctor's eyes…<br/><br/>"Then, all things considered… time I grew up," the War Doctor said, looking up to stare at a point behind Clara and I. "I've seen all I need to see. The moment has come. I'm ready."<br/><br/>With that solemn statement, he vanished right in front of me in a sudden whirl of golden energy that reminded me of the portal that had brought him here in the first place, leaving Clara and I to stare at each other in confusion.<br/><br/>"So… that happened," I said awkwardly.<br/><br/>"Yep," Clara added, glancing back at the Doctors. "Should we tell them?"<br/><br/>"Let them finish the treaty first," I said. "Whatever he's going to do… I think we both know that it isn't going to be here."<br/><br/>I just hoped that the 'rules' of time-travel would allow us to find the War Doctor before he did what I thought he was going to do…</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. The Moment</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>With the essential details of the Earth-Zygon peace treaty drawn up, allowing the Zygons discreet access to certain areas of Earth in exchange for subtle improvements to UNIT's anti-alien technology and some other later improvements, it didn't take long for the other two Doctors to realise that their younger self had vanished. As soon as Clara had revealed her revelation that the War Doctor was from a point in his life before he'd ended the Time War, the Doctor and I had returned to our TARDIS in the Black Archive while the Eleventh Doctor and Clara retrieved theirs from outside the National Gallery, the two/one Time Lord(s) swiftly setting our next destination.</p>
<p>Under other circumstances, I would have asked where we were about to go, but the grim expression on the Doctor's face ever since he heard the news was enough for me to make a good guess, and I almost didn't want to know before it was time.</p>
<p>When the TARDIS materialised and I found myself following the Doctor into a small barn with a few pieces of junk inside it, Clara and the Eleventh Doctor's TARDIS beside ours and the War Doctor standing in front of us, a large white-and-gold box behind him with what looked like a large red crystal on its top.</p>
<p>"I told you," Clara said, looking urgently at her Doctor, "he hasn't done it yet."</p>
<p>"Go away now, all of you," the War Doctor said, as he turned back to the strange box. "This is for me."</p>
<p>"These events should be time-locked; we shouldn't even be here," the Doctor noted, staring grimly around the barn.</p>
<p>"So something let us through," the Eleventh Doctor mused.</p>
<p>"Go back," the War Doctor said, his voice trembling as his hand reached out for the large red button before him, ignoring their questions even as his voice began to shake. "Go back to your lives. Go and be the Doctor that I could never be. Make it worthwhile…"</p>
<p>Listening to the old man speak as he placed his hand on the button in front of him, I wondered how my Doctor had ever convinced himself that this man wasn't him; everything he was saying right now…</p>
<p>It was everything I could imagine the Doctor- the incarnation I thought of as 'my' Doctor- saying if he was ever pushed to the limits like this man had been.</p>
<p>"All those years," the Doctor suddenly said, "burying you in my memory."</p>
<p>"Pretending you didn't exist," the Eleventh Doctor added. "Keeping you a secret, even from myself."</p>
<p>"Pretending you weren't the Doctor, when you were the Doctor more than anybody else," the Doctor continued solemnly.</p>
<p>"You were the Doctor, on the day it wasn't <em>possible </em>to get it right," the Eleventh Doctor said, as he walked over to stand beside the War Doctor and the big red button.</p>
<p>"But this time…" the Doctor said, as he joined his other two selves, reaching out to place one hand on the button over the War Doctor's hand.</p>
<p>"You don't have to do it alone," the Eleventh Doctor concluded, as he placed his own hand on top of his other selves' hands.</p>
<p>
  <em>They don't have to do it alone…</em>
</p>
<p>"No," I said, walking over to join the Doctors as I placed my hand on the button above theirs. "You don't."</p>
<p>"Bella-" the Doctor began.</p>
<p>"If the three of you do this… you're still doing it on your own," I said, looking firmly at the three Doctors. "I'm not going to let you do that."</p>
<p>That was what I had to focus on; I wasn't helping the Doctor kill one planet, I was helping him to save all the <em>other </em>planets.</p>
<p>I'd talked the Doctor into helping to create the vampires I knew just so that I would still meet the Cullens; if he was willing to do that for me despite his history with vampires, how could I leave him to set off the ultimate weapon on his own?</p>
<p>"Thank you," the War Doctor said, closing his eyes as the faint gleam of tears filled them.</p>
<p>"What we do today," the Doctor said solemnly, "is not out of fear or hatred. It is done because there is no other way."</p>
<p>"We're doing it for the children," I said firmly, remembering the War Doctor's earlier question in the cell. "For all the children who would never be born if the Daleks aren't defeated."</p>
<p>"And it is done in the name of the… <em>many </em>lives we are failing to save," the Eleventh Doctor added, his tone just as solemn as his other self's.</p>
<p>As the three of us stood in silence, I tried not to think about what would happen when the Doctors and I pressed down on this switch; we were saving more lives than we were ending… it was one planet to save the <em>universe</em>…</p>
<p>"What?" the Eleventh Doctor suddenly said, looking over at something behind the War Doctor. "What is it, what?"</p>
<p>"Nothing," Clara said shakily, even as my fellow companion looked at 'her' Doctor with tears in her eyes.</p>
<p>"No," the Eleventh Doctor said, removing his hand from the button to look at his companion. "It's something; tell me."</p>
<p>"You told me you wiped out your own people," Clara said, practically trembling as she looked at him. "I just... I never pictured you doing it, that's all."</p>
<p>"We don't have a choice-" I began, before the barn suddenly darkened around us, replaced by the ruins of a battle-scarred city, fires roaring around us as people screamed in horror.</p>
<p>"What's happening?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"Nothing," the War Doctor said solemnly. "It's a projection."</p>
<p>"Oh my God…" I said, as I watched the people around us, screaming and running as soldiers fired their weapons into the sky.</p>
<p>I didn't know how this was happening, but I didn't have to be the Doctor to guess what we were looking at.</p>
<p>"These are the people you're going to burn?" Clara asked, confirming my own theory.</p>
<p>"There isn't anything we can do," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"He's right," the Eleventh Doctor said in a low voice. "There isn't another way, there never was. Either I destroy my own people… or let the universe burn."</p>
<p>"Look at you… the three of you," Clara smiled weakly at the Eleventh Doctor, tears gleaming in her eyes as she stared at the incarnation she had come here with. "The warrior, the hero… and you."</p>
<p>"And what am I?" the Eleventh Doctor asked, walking over to stand before her.</p>
<p>"Have you really forgotten?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"Yes," the Eleventh Doctor nodded. "Maybe, yes."</p>
<p>"We've got enough warriors," Clara said with a trembling smile as the fighting waged around us. "Any old idiot could be a hero."</p>
<p>"Then what do I do?" the Eleventh Doctor asked, even as I leaned over to squeeze the Doctor's shoulder reassuringly, wanting to confirm that I didn't see him as 'any old idiot'.</p>
<p>"What you've always done," Clara said, giving him a sad little smile. "Be a doctor."</p>
<p>As though those words were a cue, the fighting ceased around us as the sky lightened, revealing people crawling out of the debris to take in the peace and quiet of a new day… a new chance at life as the war ended… a new chance to live as children embraced their parents…</p>
<p>"You told me the name you chose was a promise," Clara said. "What was the promise?"</p>
<p>"Never cruel or cowardly," the Doctor said as he stared at our surroundings.</p>
<p>"Never give up, never give in," the War Doctor continued.</p>
<p>As the dark illusion vanished around us, I found that we were standing in the barn once again, gathered around the object that the War Doctor had been about to activate, the Eleventh Doctor raising his eyebrows thoughtfully as he studied his other selves.</p>
<p>"You're not actually suggesting that we change our own personal history?" the Doctor asked his future self.</p>
<p>"We change history all the time," the Eleventh Doctor said in a low voice. "I'm suggesting something far worse."</p>
<p>"What, exactly?" the War Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"Gentlemen- and lady," the Eleventh Doctor said, nodding briefly at me as he reached into his jacket, "I have had four hundred years to think about this… I've changed my mind."</p>
<p>With those words, he aimed his sonic screwdriver at the object and the button retracted into the white box below it, leaving the four of us standing around it as Clara grinned in relief.</p>
<p>"So… what now?" I asked, looking uncertainly at the three Doctors. "I mean… the Daleks are still out there, right?"</p>
<p>"Quite," the War Doctor said grimly, staring up at the ceiling of the barn. "Whatever we believe, there's still the <em>minor </em>issue of a billion, billion Daleks up there, attacking…"</p>
<p>"Yep, there is, there <em>is</em>," the Eleventh Doctor said, as he and the Doctor paced around the barn.</p>
<p>"<em>But</em>," the Doctor said, pausing in his pacing to raise one hand in inspiration, "there's something those billion, billion Daleks don't know about."</p>
<p>"'Cause if they did, they'd probably send for reinforcements!" the Eleventh Doctor grinned.</p>
<p>"What?" Clara asked with an eager smile. "What don't they know?"</p>
<p>"This time there's <em>three </em>of us," the Eleventh Doctor grinned.</p>
<p>Despite my knowledge of the stakes we were facing, I had to agree with the Eleventh Doctor's point; if one Doctor was an asset in a crisis, three of them <em>had </em>to be able to come up with something now…</p>
<p>"Oh!" the War Doctor suddenly yelled, grabbing his head in both hands. "Oh! Oh, yes, that is good; that is <em>brilliant</em>!"</p>
<p>"Oh, oh, oh!" the Doctor said, looking at his other selves in shock. "I'm getting that too; that is <em>brilliant</em>!"</p>
<p>"I've been thinking about it for <em>centuries</em>!" the Eleventh Doctor grinned, mimicking a surfing motion as the Doctor jumped up to hit the top of the TARDIS with a broad grin</p>
<p>"She didn't just show me any old future," the War Doctor continued, "she showed me exactly the future I needed to see! Oh, Bad Wolf Girl, I could <em>kiss </em>you!"</p>
<p>"What?" I said, looking at the War Doctor in confusion for a moment before I noticed the Doctor looking at his past self in shock at his words, muttering something about 'Bad Wolf'…</p>
<p>"So what are we doing?" Clara asked, halting any thoughts I had about asking for more information on that topic. "What's the plan?"</p>
<p>"The Dalek fleets are surrounding Gallifrey, firing on it constantly," the War Doctor explained.</p>
<p>"The Sky Trench is holding, but what if the whole planet... just disappeared?" the Doctor added.</p>
<p>"What?" I asked, looking at him in confusion. "The <em>planet </em>disappears?"</p>
<p>"Leaving the Daleks firing on each other," the Doctor continued with a grin. "They'd destroy themselves in their own crossfire!"</p>
<p>"Gallifrey would be gone, the Daleks would be destroyed, and it would look to the rest of the universe as if they'd annihilated each other!" the War Doctor finished with a broad grin</p>
<p>"But where would Gallifrey be?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"Frozen!" the Doctor clarified. "Frozen in an instant of time, safe and hidden away."</p>
<p>"Exactly!" the Eleventh Doctor grinned.</p>
<p>"Like a painting," the War Doctor finished, grinning at Clara and I as we exchanged glances with the Doctors.</p>
<p>"So… what's the catch?" I asked, hating to kill the mood but needing to ask the question.</p>
<p>"Mmm?" the War Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"Well, there has to be a reason nobody did this the first time around," I explained, looking awkwardly at the three Doctors. "What's the catch?"</p>
<p>"Time," the Doctor answered grimly. "If it took four centuries for the sonic to calculate how to disintegrate a door, how long do you think it'll take to carry out the necessary calculations to move a whole planet and all the Time Lords on it out of harm's way, while <em>also </em>leaving any Daleks on the surface behind?"</p>
<p>"Four centuries?" I asked hopefully.</p>
<p>"Twice that at least," the Eleventh Doctor said grimly. "And that's assuming that we'll be able to devote enough processing power from the TARDIS to carry out the necessary calculations, since we can't exactly nip off and find a friendly supercomputer to do the job for us…"</p>
<p>"You can't?" Clara asked. "Aren't there any computers that could-?"</p>
<p>"Most of the ones that could do this were destroyed by us later on, and the ones we spared might not be that inclined to listen anyway," the Doctor said, sighing in frustration. "This is going to be difficult…"</p>
<p>"Not entirely," the War Doctor added, indicating the white box with a smile. "We <em>do </em>have this…"</p>
<p>"What are you thinking?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"For one thing," the Eleventh Doctor said, looking between Clara and I, "you two are going to need to go somewhere safe."</p>
<p>"<em>What</em>?" I said indignantly. "You can't-!"</p>
<p>"It's not a question of your capability, it's a question of practicality," the War Doctor said. "What we're going to do will require the TARDISes to devote all their processing power to putting the equations into practise, so we'll be restricting the old girls to the bare essentials, which includes restricting life support to only the console room."</p>
<p>"And even that will have to be cut to its minimum level," the Doctor added, looking apologetically at me. "We appreciate your earlier offer, Bella, but this is something I have to do with myselves."</p>
<p>For a moment, I was reminded of Edward and his decisions to try and keep me out of danger, but I quickly decided to ignore that thought; in both cases, Edward and the Doctor were just trying to keep me out of a situation where I really <em>couldn't </em>make a difference to the final outcome, rather than trying to make me feel 'inferior'.</p>
<p>I'd done what I could so far, but right now, the best thing I could do was give my friend space as he tried to save his planet…</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Believe me, I thought about having Bella and Clara witness the thirteen Doctors coming together to save Gallifrey, but since Clara was obviously absent when the Doctors came together in canon, I concluded that it made more sense for Clara and Bella to be left somewhere else so that the TARDIS could concentrate as much of its power as possible on the task of saving Gallifrey.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Talking with the Future</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>With the Doctors currently heading off into their own pasts to rally their other selves in preparation to save their planet, Clara and I had been left to wait for our respective Time Lords in a secret wing of the London National Gallery. We were currently sitting in front of a strange painting that somehow managed to create a three-dimensional image despite being clearly painted with standard paints, having informed the elderly curator that we were just going to wait for a couple of friends, but it took a few moments for me to break the silence.</p>
<p>"So," I said, stuck for anything else to say as I looked curiously at my future successor, "how did you… meet the Doctor?"</p>
<p>"Ah," Clara said, shaking her head slightly before she smiled at me. "You know, it actually might be easier if you told me how <em>you </em>met the Doctor first…"</p>
<p>"Really?" I said, looking uncertainly at her for a moment before I shrugged. "Well, to cut a long story short, I was feeling a bit depressed after my boyfriend left me and my best friend was trying to suggest that I date <em>him </em>instead, and then I ran into the Doctor and he offered to take me away for a bit to give me a chance to get over my ex."</p>
<p>"Ah," Clara said, looking at me with a sympathetic smile before she assumed a more curious expression. "What's the longer version?"</p>
<p>"It starts with the fact that my boyfriend was a vampire and my best friend was a werewolf and develops from there," I replied with a smile; I was hardly breaking the rules about keeping the secret, considering that Clara travelling with the Doctor had to be a bigger secret than the idea that vampires and werewolves were real.</p>
<p>"Huh," Clara said, blinking in surprise at the nonchalance of my previous statement. "So… you knew the world was weird <em>before </em>you met him."</p>
<p>"To say the least," I said, smiling slightly as I thought of everything I'd witnessed with the Cullens and the Doctor since my first day at Forks High School. "It's been… well, it hasn't been the safest time of my life, but it has been the most interesting."</p>
<p>"That's the Doctor for you," Clara smiled thoughtfully. "If you start travelling with him, you're giving up on safety, but you're getting the chance to see some <em>really </em>incredible sights."</p>
<p>"To say the least," I smiled at her in agreement, before I looked at my fellow companion with new curiosity. "So… how did you meet him?"</p>
<p>"Ah," Clara said, looking thoughtfully at me for a moment before she shrugged and smiled. "Actually, from the Doctor's perspective, my first meeting with him ended with my death."</p>
<p>I could only blink in confusion at that statement.</p>
<p>"You <em>died</em>?" I asked in confusion. "When you <em>met </em>him?"</p>
<p>"From what I remember, I crash-landed on this planet that was used as a Dalek asylum for Daleks who were too mentally traumatised to continue acting as soldiers but who the Daleks didn't want to destroy because they saw their hatred as… 'beautiful'," Clara said, looking awkwardly around before she continued her story. "From what the Doctor told me, I was infected by these nanite things the Daleks used as part of the Asylum's security protocols, and I ended up being… well, I was turned <em>into </em>a Dalek."</p>
<p>"A Dalek," I repeated uncertainly, looking Clara over in a stunned attempt to make sure I hadn't missed something. "You… seem to have a lot of limbs for a Dalek."</p>
<p>"Yeah, well, that particular encounter ended with the Daleks destroying the Asylum once the Doctor shut down the force field protecting it, so I was blown up along with the rest of them, apparently," Clara explained, in a disturbingly dismissive tone for what had to have been a very traumatic experience. "The Doctor thought that was it, but then he encountered… well, he found <em>another </em>me in Victorian London acting as a governess for a wealthy family, and I ended up dying again to save his life… and then he eventually found me during this mess involving something downloading human consciousnesses into some sort of Wi-Fi…"</p>
<p>"Hold on a minute; you've died <em>three times</em>?" I interjected, looking at her incredulously. "How did you <em>do </em>that?"</p>
<p>"If it helps, I only remembered most of this a short while ago," Clara explained, looking briefly uncomfortable before she continued her story. "The Doctor and I… long story short, we found ourselves in a position where one of his enemies had found a way to attack the Doctor's entire timestream. How is… well, complicated… but his enemy had entered the timestream and was attacking the Doctor's entire life, intending to undo all of his old victories and ensure his defeat."</p>
<p>"Oh my God…" I said, my eyes widening at the memory of that dark alternate Earth I'd witnessed with the original Doctor and Steven only a few months ago. "Was it Mortimus?"</p>
<p>"Who?" Clara asked.</p>
<p>"The person who attacked the Doctor's timeline; was it Mortimus?" I asked again. "Or the Monk, or some name that sounds like either of those-"</p>
<p>"No, it was… something the Doctor identified as 'the Great Intelligence'," Clara said, looking at me with renewed curiosity. "Who was Mortimus?"</p>
<p>"Just… well, he was a madman who tried to stop the Time War by infecting the Doctor with this temporal virus that would have erased him from history," I explained, shuddering slightly as I recalled my few hours on that shattered alternate Earth.</p>
<p>"A virus?" Clara repeated in confusion. "How could a <em>virus </em>erase someone from history?"</p>
<p>"Something about this virus reprogramming the victim's chronal energy rather than their cells' DNA; I wasn't entirely clear on how…" I explained, shrugging awkwardly before focusing back on Clara. "The point is, he actually almost managed to erase the Doctor from history with that virus, but the Doctor did… something… that meant that the virus thought his first regeneration was his actual <em>birth</em>, so he was able to send me back to tell his first body what had happened and help him work out how to undo it."</p>
<p>"Ah," Clara said, looking at me with a new respect and a slight smile. "Nice job."</p>
<p>"Thanks," I said, shrugging before I turned our focus back to her story. "So, what happened with that attack on the Doctor's timestream you were telling me about?"</p>
<p>"Oh, I was able to cancel out the Great Intelligence's attack by entering the timestream myself," Clara explained, her casual tone at odds with the discomfort she was displaying in the rest of her manner. "I don't remember all of it, but I was… well, some parts of me were basically <em>fractured</em> across the Doctor's timeline, either appearing there for just long enough to stop whatever the Intelligence was doing or creating a completely new life for myself until the time came for me to save the Doctor in that time zone."</p>
<p>"Huh," I said, lost for anything else to say as I looked uncertainly at my successor.</p>
<p>I'd thought that I'd been through a lot when I found myself in a universe where the Doctor had never existed, but compared to what Clara had been through in order to save him from an attack like nothing I could imagine…</p>
<p>"How much of that… <em>do </em>you remember?" I asked curiously, looking uncertainly at the older girl as I tried to imagine what she must have been through.</p>
<p>"Just… bits and pieces, more than anything," Clara shrugged. "I mean, I remember seeing all his faces at some point or another, but I only recall a few of my more detailed lives; as I said, most of the time I was just there long enough to stop the Intelligence doing something specific or to save the Doctor from something he might have missed, rather than actually <em>meet </em>him."</p>
<p>"I… see," I said, trying and failing to picture what it must be like to have that kind of experience crammed into one mind.</p>
<p>"I think the Doctor might have done something to block most of the experience, but… well…" Clara said, shrugging awkwardly as she looked at me.</p>
<p>"It was probably an incredible experience, but it also comes under one of those 'things man wasn't meant to know' headings, right?" I asked, smiling at Clara in understanding. "Tell me about it; I <em>never </em>wanted to learn that someone actually thought it would be a good idea to create a network of bombs capable of destroying Earth…"</p>
<p>"And that's just one thing; can you imagine what else is out there?" Clara asked, looking up at the ceiling with a sigh. "I mean, I know we aren't exactly a perfect species, but I sometimes wonder how the Doctor can like us so much when we screw up like that…"</p>
<p>"Maybe for the moments when we don't?" I asked, recalling the Doctor's compliments of the other passengers on the 200 bus during that affair with the flying manta-things. "It's like anything, really; you need to focus on what they did <em>right</em>, rather than just get upset about what they did wrong."</p>
<p>"Here, here," Clara said, nodding at me with a new smile before she looked at me with new curiosity. "So what's the most interesting thing you've seen so far?"</p>
<p>"The world where fairy-tales are real and I had to help Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty defeat a Time Lord who was trying to become a god," I answered promptly.</p>
<p>"Huh," Clara said, blinking in surprise as she looked at me. "And I thought I'd seen it all with the parasite sun that demanded sacrifice or it'd destroy the universe…"</p>
<p>As we fell into our conversation, I found myself smiling as we talked about everything we'd seen in our time with the Doctor, ranging from the terrifying to the incredible and so many variations between the two.</p>
<p>Life in the TARDIS was never safe, but this opportunity to talk to someone in the same position as me really helped to reinforce why I'd made the right call during that long-ago day in Forks.</p>
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<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Forgetting the Future</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>In advance, if anyone wonders about the Doctors' confusion about what happened at Gallifrey, it's intended as a reference to the Twelfth Doctor's role in those events; since they can't remember that a future self was present, their memories of the specific events have become slightly blurred, just as the War and Tenth Doctors will forget these events completely once they leave the Eleventh.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When the TARDISes rematerialized in the Gallery, it was almost anti-climatic. Clara and I had lost track of time as we exchanged our stories of our time with the Doctor, ranging from Clara's role in convincing the Doctor to save Amy Johnson to my own trip to Hollywood in the 1950s when we'd encountered the Selyoids, but when the three TARDISes rematerialized beside us as we sat in front of the painting, the Doctors simply walking out as though they'd just gone to check something in a library rather than trying to save their people.</p>
<p>"All good here?" the Eleventh Doctor asked, looking between Clara and I with a slight smile.</p>
<p>"Fine," Clara said, getting up to give the youngest-looking Doctor a warm hug as the War Doctor emerged from his TARDIS with a tray containing cups of tea of all things.</p>
<p>"So…" I began, looking curiously at 'my' Doctor as we each accepted a cup from the War Doctor's tray, "what happened?"</p>
<p>"Not… sure," the Doctor said, taking a moment to think before he shook his head in a grim manner. "We made it to Gallifrey all right, and we <em>definitely </em>made contact with our other selves before we got there, but afterward…"</p>
<p>"It's all a bit unclear," the Eleventh Doctor finished, as he and Clara took two cups from the War Doctor's tray, the Doctors turning around to study the painting. "Maybe because so many of us were there at once, or maybe it was the sheer scale of what we were trying to do caused some kind of temporal ripple effect…"</p>
<p>"In the end, I don't suppose we'll ever know if we actually succeeded," the War Doctor mused, as he poured his tea and dropped a sugar cube into his cup. "But at worst, we failed doing the right thing, as opposed to succeeding in doing the wrong."</p>
<p>"Life and soul, you are," Clara noted, looking grimly at the War Doctor before taking a sip of her own tea.</p>
<p>"What is it actually called?" the Doctor asked, changing the topic as he and his future self studied the strange three-dimensional painting that Clara and I had been looking at.</p>
<p>"Well, there's some debate," the Eleventh Doctor noted. "Either <em>No More </em>or <em>Gallifrey Falls</em>."</p>
<p>"Not very encouraging," the War Doctor mused, voicing my own thoughts on the matter as I studied the painting; 'No More' was slightly more hopeful as we could assume that it meant that such a war would never happen again, but it still wasn't <em>that </em>encouraging.</p>
<p>"How did it get here?" the Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"No idea," the Eleventh Doctor said, lowering his glasses as he looked at the painting.</p>
<p>"There's always something we don't know, isn't there?" the Doctor mused, turning to look at his future self as he took another sip of his tea.</p>
<p>"Well, that's why we travel, right?" I suggested with a slight smile. "To find things out?"</p>
<p>"One should certainly hope so," the War Doctor mused, as he stood up and walked over to his other selves. "Well, gentlemen, it has been an honour… and a privilege."</p>
<p>"Likewise," the Doctor said.</p>
<p>"Doctor," the Eleventh Doctor added, grinning at his past self, the War Doctor returning the comment with a grateful smile of his own.</p>
<p>"And if I grow to be half the man that you two are," the old man said, turning to smile at Clara and I, "I shall be happy indeed."</p>
<p>"Uh… thanks?" I said, embarrassed at the idea that I could actually be considered that admirable by any version of <em>the Doctor</em>.</p>
<p>"That's right; aim high!" Clara smiled, getting up to give the War Doctor a brief kiss on the cheek, clearly more comfortable with the compliment than I was.</p>
<p>"I won't remember this, will I?" the old Time Lord asked, looking solemnly back at the four of us.</p>
<p>"The time streams are out of sync; you can't retain it," the Eleventh Doctor confirmed.</p>
<p>"So I won't remember that I tried to save Gallifrey, rather than burn it," the War Doctor said, his grim expression preventing me from asking if I'd be subjected to that same effect; the idea of something editing my memory was intimidating, but the old man in front of me would forget everything he'd just achieved…</p>
<p>"I'll have to live with that," the War Doctor concluded, looking resolutely around the room. "But for now, for this moment... I am the Doctor again. Thank you."</p>
<p>It might be a small thing in the grand scheme of things, but looking at the old man standing there now, contrasting him with the guilt-ridden mess he'd been when I'd first met him…</p>
<p>Whatever he'd become during the Time War, he was ready to be the Doctor once more.</p>
<p>"Which one is mine?" he asked, indicating the three TARDISes at one side of the room, the other two Doctors indicating the battered box on the right. As he walked into the ship, the War Doctor looked back at us with a brief smile before he walked through the doors, leaving me with nothing to do but watch as the old man vanished.</p>
<p>He'd just saved his planet and ended the worst war in history… and his reward would be to forget what he'd just accomplished.</p>
<p>"I won't remember either-" the Doctor began as he removed his glasses.</p>
<p>"What about me?"</p>
<p>"What?" the two remaining Doctors said, looking sharply at me.</p>
<p>"Well…" I said, suddenly feeling uncomfortable at the thought of interrupting even if I was committed to asking the question now. "I mean, I understand why… <em>my </em>Doctor has to forget his future, but… will <em>I </em>have to forget all this?"</p>
<p>"Yes and no," the two Doctors said at once.</p>
<p>"Basically," the Eleventh Doctor explained as he looked at me, "since you haven't really learned anything about <em>your </em>future- I mean, you know that you'll leave me, but you always know that's going to happen at some point- there's no need for you to <em>forget </em>anything, but for obvious reasons we can't risk you letting something slip about it to this chap here…"</p>
<p>"As a result," the Doctor continued, "the TARDIS's telepathic circuits will… 'nudge' your mind so that you just aren't able to talk about these events until you and I have parted company for good… or at least for the foreseeable future, anyway. You'll <em>remember </em>what's happened here, but you won't be able to talk about it until you're fairly sure I won't be coming back to hear someone else talking about it."</p>
<p>"OK," I said, nodding in uncertain acceptance. "That's… good, I guess?"</p>
<p>I still didn't like the idea of something editing my mind like that, but I appreciated that time was a very complex thing; it wasn't like the Doctors were doing this to <em>hurt </em>me…</p>
<p>"Anyway," the Doctor continued, "since I won't remember, and Bella's safe, you might as well tell me."</p>
<p>"Tell you what?" the Eleventh Doctor asked.</p>
<p>"Where it is we're going that you don't want to talk about," the Doctor clarified.</p>
<p>"I saw Trenzalore," the Eleventh Doctor said at last, after looking uncertainly at Clara. "Where we're buried. We die in battle among millions."</p>
<p>"Oh my God…" I said, looking between the two Doctors in shock.</p>
<p>Ever since I'd learned about regeneration, I'd known that the Doctor wasn't immortal, and I even accepted that it was still possible to kill the Cullens no matter how strong they were, but to hear that the Doctor was going to be <em>dead </em>in the future… that there'd actually be a time when he was gone forever…</p>
<p>The only thing worse than that was thinking about how the Doctor must have felt at the idea of visiting his own <em>grave</em>…</p>
<p>"That's not how it's supposed to be," the Doctor said firmly, voicing my thoughts before I could say anything.</p>
<p>"That's how the story ends," the Eleventh Doctor said in a low voice. "Nothing we can do about it. Trenzalore is where you're going."</p>
<p>"Oh, never say nothing," the Doctor said, eliciting a brief smile from his future self as he shook the other Time Lord's hand. "Anyway… good to know my future is in safe hands. Keep a tight hold on it, Clara."</p>
<p>"On it!" Clara confirmed, standing up and walking over to shake my hand. "Make sure he doesn't do anything stupid until the time's right, OK?"</p>
<p>"Uh… same to you?" I said, lost for the right thing to say to something like that.</p>
<p>"Trenzalore," the Doctor mused as he walked back to our TARDIS and unlocked the door. "We need a new destination, because… I don't want to go."</p>
<p>As he looked back at his future self, I silently walked into the TARDIS once again, staring around at our regular console room as I thought about everything we'd just done.</p>
<p>I'd seen the Doctor's future, I'd saved London, witnessed the historical creation of a treaty between Earth and an alien race, I'd participated in the last act of the Time War while meeting a man even the Doctor didn't like to think about, learned where the Doctor was destined to die for the last time… and now I'd never be able to talk about it for as long as I travelled with the Doctor.</p>
<p>Still… as the Doctor set the ship in motion to depart for our next adventure, I had to smile at the thought of what we'd accomplished.</p>
<p>For just a few moments, in a small way, I'd been able to help the most incredible man I'd ever met as he attempted to undo his greatest regret…</p>
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